


Amends

by actualcheetah



Category: The Walking Dead & Related Fandoms, The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Hes still an asshole though, Negan works on the Green Farm instead of being ghe Savior leader, Not Canon Compliant, The '&' dosen't mean they hook up, it implies a friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-01
Updated: 2019-12-01
Packaged: 2021-02-26 06:21:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21629023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/actualcheetah/pseuds/actualcheetah
Summary: If there is a God out there, he knows this is his karma.
Relationships: Beth Green & Negan, Maggie Greene & Negan
Kudos: 2





	Amends

**Author's Note:**

> This story will be following Negan and his personal growth. He'll be a little OOC at the beginning because... that's just how he ended up coming out at the beginning.
> 
> I'll definitely try to capture his Negan essences by the time Rick and Co. show up, so dont worry too hard!
> 
> This story may not be updated very regularly -take a look at my other stories, I have a very shitty update schedule but I have a life outside of writing non-profit stories- but please don't lose hope in it if it's been a few weeks since the last update. I'm almost constantly thinking of how to improve and add onto my stories, and this one will be no different.
> 
> And, incase it got buried in there, this story is non-profit. I'm in no way being paid to write this and dont own any characters in the story unless stated otherwise!
> 
> ENJOY!

Three months before what the world would collectively know as the Apocalypse, Negan and his wife had been driving from their small town just outside of San Antonio, Texas, to an Oncologist in Atlantia, Georgia. 

Lucille had been feeling sick and flemish for weeks, and at first the couple had been excited. They'd been trying for a baby for months and thought that maybe, just maybe, they caught a break. 

She took test after test but they all came up negative. Eventually they scheduled a doctors appointment to do bloodwork. At home, urine pregnancy tests weren't always accurate and it could be weeks before a positive result appeared on one of those little sticks.

They crossed their fingers and prayed every night until the day of the appointment.

Negan should've known he wasn't so lucky.

They didn't even make it out their front door before she vomiting up her breakfast, followed by bile, and lastly blood. A lot of blood.

When he got her to the hospital, she was pale, her skin hot and sweaty. They ran bloodwork and gave them the bad news.

Lucille, his gorgeous wife and the light of his entire fucking world, had stage four breast cancer as well as cysts in her stomach that had started rupturing. The doctors let them know that they didn't have the necessary equipment in their small town hospital to treat her, but they did out in Georgia. 

So, they sold what they could part with, liquidated what they couldn't sell, packed everything else into Negans old muscle car, and headed out. He called the school on his way out of the state and told them he wouldn't be coming back.

It would've taken less than two days to get there, with minimal stopping, but Lucille's condition worsened while they drove. Add on the fact Negan was the only one able to drive and the two day trip took nearly a week.

Negan never once blamed her but she continously apologized.

They stopped at a little, cheap hotel about ten miles from the city center, rented a room for the month, as that's the most the hotel would let you rent at a time, dropped their things off, then headed for the hospital. Despite renting out the hotel room, Negan never stayed there, instead insisting he stay with Lucille at the hospital.

The staff, while dubious of letting him sleep there at night, allowed it considering she was unconscious from the pain and the medicine most of the time, and would need someone there to sign for any and all procedures.

Once their month ended in the hotel, Negan kept everything in his car and slept in backseat, car parked in the parking lot, on nights the staff wouldn't let him stay with Lucille. It was after a week and a half of doing this that he ran into a nice young girl named Beth Greene. She was visiting her mother, who was sick with a nasty case of drug resistant pneumonia and was only getting worse by the day, and asked him if he was new in town, stating that how he talked was different from everyone else she knew and that she'd never seen him before.

The two sat and talked in the cafeteria for a few hours, and for the first time since Lucille got sick, felt himself relax a little.

Sometime during their talk, she managed to weasel the information that he wasn't sleeping in a bed at night and expressed her horror in the form of a small gasp, a hand pressed to her collarbone, and a softly spoken "bless your heart".

"That won't do, Negan! If my mama was feeling better I'm sure she'd agree with me. I'll ask my daddy if you can do some work around the farm and give you a place to sleep at night. And before you argue," she spoke over him, shushing him with a wagging finger. "Your wife needs you takin' care of yourself. I'm sure she'd tell you that sleepin' in your car isn't healthy, and you'll chew through any savings you had if you keep stayin' in motels."

They're discussing the kind of work there is to do on the farm, and Negan is insisting that he doesn't want to burden the Greene's by sleeping on their couch, when a young doctor shuffles up to him, face downcast and staring at the floor as if it'll give him the answers he's looking for. Before anything can pass the man's lips, Negan can already feel his heart clenching.

"There was a complication, sir, and Lucille... Mrs. Nicholes... had to rushed to emergency surgery. We think one of the larger cysts in her stomach ruptured while she slept and sent a clot to her brain, causing her to hemorrhage and stroke out." He's hardly hearing the man speak anymore, the ringing in his ears over-taking his senses. A hand grabs his shoulder from behind but he's too focused on not throwing up to shrug it off or break the fingers curling into his flesh. "The surgeons stabilized her but she's still in critical condition. We... don't know when she'll wake up..." 

Negan blinks and suddenly he's not in the cafeteria anymore, instead standing over Lucilles still form on a too bright bed, her head haloed with gauze and her eyes circled with bruises, throat bulging from a plasticky-rubber tube that's keeping her lungs in working condition.

Her hand is in his own, clenched so tightly he knows she'd be crying out and slapping him upside the head and chiding him for not knowing his own strength, while his bottom lip wobbles. Her skin in cool to the touch and the dead-weight that settles in his palm brings him no comfort.

Slowly, he sinks to the chair that sits by her bedside -the one he'd been using as a bed day in and day out for six weeks- and bows his head until his forehead presses to his hand. Only then does he allow himself to weep.

He doesn't deserve to be sad, he knows.

If there is a God out there, and he seriously doubts there is if they can be so cruel to his wife, he knows this is his karma. For cheating on his wife with the secretary at his job for multiple years. For being an asshole to children five days a week. For being an assole to everyone else all seven days of the week. 

He confesses to Lucille about the cheating. He suspects she already knows about it and only put up with him most days because divorces are expensive and he's always chosen her at the end of the day, but he can't be sure anymore and will probably never get the chance to find out.

When her heart monitor flatlines, he freezes and stares at it for what feels like years but is less than half a second before he's shouting for a nurse. They're in the room before he can finish the sentence and push him into the hallway, "for space" they claim but he knows it's because he's babbling like a baby and probably doesn't look much better than one.

Thirteen minutes and forty-three seconds later, everyone in the room stops moving and a defeated air surrounds them. A doctor pulls his sleeve up and looks at his watch, mouthing words. Once his mouth finishes moving, the nurses gather their things while two others cover Lucilles face with her sheets.

Negan knows what it means but finds himself in a state of disbelief for so long tht when he finally brings himself back from his disassociation, he's no longer in the hospital.

Hell, hes no longer in Atlanta.

Looming before him is a large white house, two stories with a wrap around porch and plenty of open space.

"You've been standing there an awful long time, you alright?" 

He blinks and sees a tall, leggy brunette standing just outside the screen door, head tilted and staring at him like he's about to collapse. Now that he thinks about it, he feels close to falling down.

"Y-yeah. Excuse my French, but, where.... in the fuck am I?" Negan asks finally, his voice cracking and jaw creaking in a way that indicates he hasn't spoken much recently.

"Greene Ranch." Brunette Legs says, sticking her hand sin her back pockets while she walks towards him. "We all heard 'bout what happened with your wife. Didn't men to intrude or nothin', Beth has a thing for findin' strays and lost things, and bringin' 'em back here. Daddy said you could stay as long as there was work to do. Says 'Hard work keeps a grievin' mind occupied'." She said matter-of-factly and paused when she reached him, thrusting a hand straight into his own, rough callouses and strong fingers squeezing his infinitely softer hand into a bone breaking hand-shake. "Names Maggie, Greene." 

Negan blinked at the young woman, then up at the building behind her and finally returned the handshake.


End file.
